Joe
H Tipton was born in McCaysville, Georgia
on February 18, 1922. A shortstop on the sandlots of McCaysville,
he was signed by the Cleveland Indians in 1941 and played the
outfield with the Appleton Papermakers of the Wisconsin State
League that year. In 1942 he joined the Charleston Senators of
the Mid-Atlantic League and batted .313 in 81 games.

Tipton lost the next three years to
military service, serving with the Navy aboard the escort
carrier USS Kadashan Bay (CVE-76) in the Pacific. He
was at Leyte, Okinawa and Iwo Jima,
and survived a kamikaze attack on January 8, 1945, when the
Kadashan Bay
was hit amidships directly below the bridge. After an hour and a
half of feverish damage control effort, fires and flooding were
checked.

Tipton returned to professional baseball in 1946. “When I came
back for the 1946 season,” he told
The Sporting News on
March 10, 1948, “I knew I’d have to work harder than ever. I had
been off the diamond so long. He was with the Harrisburg
Senators of the InterState League that season and the hard work
paid off. Spending time in the outfield as well as learning to
work behind the plate, Tipton batted .327 in 104 games. In 1947,
having converted to catcher full-time, he led the Eastern League
with a .375 batting average playing for the Wilkes-Barre Barons.
He joined the Indians in 1948, making his major league debut on
May 2 and played 47 games as a back-up for Jim Hegan,
appearing in one game of the World Series against Boston.

Tipton was traded
to the White Sox for 1949 and joined the Philadelphia Athletics
in 1950. He was back with the Cleveland Indians in 1952 and
ended his major league career with the Washington Senators in
1954. Tipton finished his professional playing days with the
Memphis Chicks of the Southern Association in 1955 and went on
to manage the Panama City Fliers of the Alabama-Florida League
in 1958.

The escort carrier USS Kadashan Bay
(CVE-76)

Joe Tipton passed
away in Birmingham, Alabama on March 1, 1994. He was 72.